Where do I begin with this one?
Back when I was growing up, families were large and film was for special occasions.
It truly is a treat to see photographs from the 1960’s, especially those that were not “holiday” photos.
My short list off the top of my head of things I wish had been photographed:
- The Golden Girl. Even though I can still see my golden little sister as though it was yesterday, I would LOVE to have a picture of the time she was playing in our basement and overturned a whole can of gold paint onto her head. She was totally covered in gold – even her eyelashes! It really was something to behold. My mom called the doctor for advice and our neighbor, Eunice, came over to help my mom get the gold paint off my sister.
- I can still see little Laura in my mind with her bald patches, but I sure would enjoy having a picture of our little neighbor girl after she decided to be a big girl and wash her own hair---but washed it with NAIR (the hair removal lotion)! Oh, Flossie! You made neighborhood history with that one!
- Maybe someday we’ll have the technology to print pictures remembered from our brains. Until then, I will safeguard the memory I have of my dad carrying my injured little brother in his arms up the sidewalk to our house. They had been at a cemetery and a tombstone had toppled over onto my brother! He wasn’t bleeding, so I don’t think he went to a doctor (back then, the presence of blood was sort of a prerequisite for a trip to the doctor). My bother was ok, but that was scary.
- I would love a photograph of all six of us kids packed like sardines into the old car for a trip to grandma’s. I would not want the photographer to miss the child lying in the back window (the favorite spot to be) or in the floorboards. Seatbelts? What are seatbelts?
- Backyard sports…thanks to my mom, we do have a couple of pictures of our back yard games, but I wish someone would have spared just a little film to capture the excitement of throwing the bat and choosing up teams. That bat-throwing ceremony was really something….all the kids would gather ‘round as the two captains competed to see who could “choose” first OR which team would get to bat first. It really was exciting! That thumb stretching maneuver over the head of the bat at the end was especially climactic and photo-worthy.
- I am sadly positive there are no existing photographs of any of us playing in the woods and creeks near the neighborhood. If I had to choose one woods scene for my personal time capsule, it might be of the time we were all held hostage in treetops when cows wandered into the woods as we were playing. We took to the treetops and must have all spent three or four hours aloft, waiting for the cows to leave. Oh! The things we all talked about, resigned to our posts in the trees that long afternoon!
- Sure wish someone had photographed one of our Kick-the-Can games…
- I wish we had some pictures of our forays to the big creek at Maker’s Mark. What a wonderful treat it was for us to go there on a hot summer day!
- Blackberry picking. Shew. Kids today have no idea what THAT little summer activity/chore was like AT ALL. But kids from the sixties and before remember all too well how it went. Pick the hottest day of the year. Put on hot clothing to cover your whole body as much as possible as a safeguard against thorns and ticks. Walk to or be dropped off at a good blackberry patch. Find blackberries, and get pricked with thorns every time you reach for that great big pretty one. Get really hungry and tired. Eat some blackberries and lay down on the grass and make pictures out of the big white puffy clouds and just hope your mom will have enough blackberries to make Jam Cakes for the St. Francis Picnic.
- The time Tommy Johnson fell in the sewer at St. Francis Grade School. The Sisters didn’t send him home – OH NO! - they laid him out on the grass so he could “dry out”. When we all ran out to recess after lunch, there was little Tommy just lying there on the grass in the sun drying out. Man, THAT was a missed photo op for sure.
I could go on forever about pictures I wish had been taken, but I’ll stop now.
I am sure you can think of plenty of your own wishes…for those photographs that were never taken.
We have no excuses now, though, thank goodness.
